Awesome summary of the Romoplata. I've been working this move for the last month or so with great success, and can say that all of this advice is good (much of it I had to deduce for myself). Thanks for another awesome writeup.

Here are a couple comments I have:

Step 3: I find that this step can generally be skipped if you are of about equal size with your opponent. If he's much larger than you, it will likely be necessary, but even then you can sometimes force it.

Breaking the grip when they defend safely during rolling? This is probably the hardest part of this submission for me. How do you handle this Aesopian?

If you are starting from the crucifix on knees, the highest percentage method is to cross your front knee over the rear calf then straighten your leg, passing the arm from one leg to the other.

This is the only method I know to get the cross without them getting out of turtling, what are the other methods? To be fair, I get this method at a very high percentage. The hardest part of this, IMO, is getting them to grab your leg (not counting an attempted single leg) but you can often bait it and get them to bite. My general rule is to get into a side position and start baiting a choke while my front leg is right there waiting to be grabbed.

What are the other finishes? I know you can--technically--finish from your back, but I've never gotten it, and I know you can finish the way you described in the article (that's how I always finish it) but I don't know any others.

How do you deal with losing it and recovering into a decent position? That's probably the most dangerous part of this move to me. If you screw up and he can sit up, the best you can realistically hope for is half guard, and more likely you'll end up in side control.

Originally Posted by Osiris

Imagine if track was run like the martial arts community. While the winning teams would just sprint down the field, smoking the competition, you'd have a bunch of losers running around explaining how they can skip down the track just as fast. Never mind that it doesn't fucking work. Oh no, they're too fast for track. They run on the STREET.

2. Step 3: like you said, you can skip it sometimes, especially when they are your size. Grabbing the knee to make them roll isn't as important in these case, but I still do it since it offers the greatest amount of control and makes locking down their upper body easier at the end since your arm is in place. It will also prevent them from rolling out (pre-roll) or sitting up (post-roll) to escape.

It's comparable to the difference between passing guard by locking down the upper body and deliberate pressure versus just trying to jump past the legs. Yeah, it works, but only with speed and explosiveness, and you run into trouble when someone stronger or better than you counters.

3. I don't worry much about them defending by grabbing the inside of their thigh, their belt or their other hand. I actually let me people defend like this when I'm doing the move so I don't risk hurting them during the roll.

Just continue the move like normal, flip them over on their back and lock down their upper body. At this point, start scooting your hips back towards their head. Keep scooting and scooting until their grip breaks. Your legs and hip movement should always be stronger than their grip strength.

I just got a great idea on how to break this grip but I'll get back to you on it once I've tried it out.

4. That's really about the only way to cross the arm back from the crucifix on knees. The only variation I use is sometimes trying to do the straight armlock where you sprawl your leg back and drop your hips, so the only way for them to escape is to cross their arm back.

I will go into detail on how to trap the arm from side ride later. SUSPENSE!

5. I sometimes finish the move as a straight elbow lock but this is usually only when someone is trying to escape by pulling their arm out. Their wrist gets trapped behind my calf and my thigh presses into their elbow. I don't like this finish since it is more prone to slipping out. I will stop trying to do finish, move my hips in closer and use my free hand to pull their arm deeper and bend it again. Then I'll go back to finishing.

6. If he escapes at the end you just need to have good escapes from bottom, good guard returns and enjoy scrambling. Much like when you lose any submission.

Imagine if track was run like the martial arts community. While the winning teams would just sprint down the field, smoking the competition, you'd have a bunch of losers running around explaining how they can skip down the track just as fast. Never mind that it doesn't fucking work. Oh no, they're too fast for track. They run on the STREET.

I came up with this setup last night when I was going with a brown belt so big that I felt he would instantly roll me if I stayed to tight to his back:

Low sideride, hip on hip, sprawled heavy. Grabbing around the waist, holding both lapels to control them if they try to turn. I am almost behind them, but I am staying slightly to their left side. I am making sure not to put my right knee between their legs for the rolling kneebar.

I am still worried about being rolled, so I stand and put my right knee in their hip, keeping my lapel grips. It's like knee-on-turtle. Now if they start rolling me, I'm more free to bail or switch sides.

(I learned this position from a brown belt who I saw using it very well against a visiting black belt. He said he does it when he doesn't know what kind of reversals someone has, or if they are a big guy, since he can just release everything instead of getting reversed, which isn't possible if his arms or legs are deeply committed to sideride. His standard move is to ride them until they try to turn into him, then he quickly runs to the other side, pulling the lapels and dragged them to their back. He brings his chest against their back as they roll so that he ends in a north-south position, only with their head on his shoulder, so he can drive it into their chest.)

I leaned in and reached across the neck with my left hand for the clock choke grip. He defended with his left hand, which opened his elbow.

I stepped my right foot down into his armpit and drove though to trap his arm, dropping down into the reverse omoplata trigger position (crucifix from the top with arm crossed back).

Continue with the reverse omoplata as usual.

Even if you don't use this particular setup, understand that you can attack their neck with a clock choke grip to get them to open up the space between their elbow, knee and armpit. This will allow you to put your knee or foot in more easily, since they cannot defend their neck without bringing their elbow forward.

Putting your foot out for them to grab is a surprisingly effective way to get the arm for the crucifix, but they will stop doing it once they get caught a couple times.

The Strong Method is to drive your rear knee into the space between their elbow, knee and armpit. Once you've got your knee in, you want to drive it up towards their head to open their elbow and exposed their forearm (this is small but important detail I realized the importance of recently). Then you dig with your heel of your front leg to hook their forearm and drag their arm into the crucifix.

This in combination with threatening clocks chokes is how I almost always open someone up who is turtling really tightly.

One thing I don't understand. Why is this a "reverse" omoplata? It is exactly the same as my beloved omoplata counter to the single leg. It's really just forcing the arm into that position, and doing a plain rolling omoplata.

You've just added a finish for the omoplata escape where the guy rolls. That's the only part I can see being somehow "reverse."

There's two separate innovations to this sequence. One is to get the arm in position for the omoplata roll from turtle. Basically it's an omoplata attack on the turtle.

The second is a re-counter finish for the omoplata, where the opponent tries to roll out.

Calling this whole sequence a "reverse omoplata," imo, is just confusing and not really accurate, unless you are just referring to the finish, which doesn't require the complicated setup.

You could have avoided that whole post if you took a closer look at the technique I am doing -- it is not the normal omoplata. I know the rolling omoplata to counter the single leg, which is what you are confusing this for. In the reverse omoplata you are actually getting the crucifix and trapping their arm with your leg in a different way.

The real "reverse" aspect is in the finish. It is opposite to a normal omoplata in several ways, but it is still a shoulder lock with the leg.

Omoplata finish -- they are belly down, you facing their head:

Reverse omoplata finish -- they are belly up, you are facing their legs:

The finishing position and the way the pressure is being applied to the shoulder are completely different, so calling it "reverse" to an omoplata is completely accurate.

Yeah, that's what I meant. I can see why you would call the finish a reverse omoplata, although I think inverted omoplata might be a better name. I just think the sequence really is a combination of an omoplata attack on the turtle from crucifix, with a reverse omoplata finish added if he rolls. You can do either without the other.

I am an omoplata addict, it has become the focal point of my game, so I appreciate all the stuff you post on it.

Quick question -- for the reverse omoplata finish, how should you use your arms? I see in that photo the guy isn't using his right arm at all, and barely his left (slightly blocking the guy's arm). Have you found any particularly good ways to keep the guy from escaping the position?